Reason #45 why Galactic Citizen Pacing/Limits Must Be Re-evaluated

In the early days of my galaxy, there were 6 different races.  Each of us would generate, for our own civilizations, one Galactic Citizen each 10 turns.

One day, about 2 years into our exploration, the gruff and hungry Drengin leader declared War on my entire race.  Until that point, my only interaction with him was when one of my trade freighters had crossed path with a small scout ship from the then Drengin Colonies at the far North of our galaxy.  The captain of the freighter reported a mild concern not that the captain of the scout ship had expressed hunger, but how he expressed it.

But the Drengin were so far away and our people were busy colonizing, mining, and learning all we could about our part of the galaxy.

About a year later, the Altarians declared War on us, even before greeting us.

For the next 7 years, the Terran Alliance prosecuted the "War of the Existentials", mostly fighting the Altarians and taking planet after planet and system after system, while simultaneously building our defenses against the Drengin.  Finally, the beautiful-though-in-need-of-a-day-in-the-sun Altarian leader proposed a Peace Treaty.  Our leadership agreed, and we moved our navies Northwestward, to confront the growing Drengin threat, with which we were technically still at War.  A few scant weeks later, the Altarian Resistance fell, either by collapsing from the rot within, or by having its last world conquered by another race sharing our galaxy.

After about a year of fighting the Drengin, they suddenly surrendered all of their assets to us, ending that war too.

TL/DR:

We started with 3 races, each generating a Galactic Citizen every 10 turns.

One race (mine) conquers an entire civilization, and 90%+ of another.  Through a combination of organic growth and conquest (though we never declared War or antagonized any other civilization to the brink of War), the Terran Alliance is now 3 to 4 times LARGER than it was, with much greater diversity in DNA, education systems, manufacturing, trade, and resource production.  In fact, we are so diverse that humans only make up about a third of the entire population now.

Question:  Why does such a huge and diverse population only generate ONE Galactic Citizen every 10 turns, and not at least the three that the original three civilizations generated?

Conclusion:  This example is given in light of conquest, but I still feel that the production of Galactic Citizens needs to be reassessed in light of how communities and civilizations actually work as they grow, especially if governance works smoothly and education systems are functioning correctly.  I think it's appropriate to consider some form of "scaling up" as a civilization grows.  Maybe not in a straight-line, due to the bureaucratic and administrative costs of bigger and bigger organizations, but some scaling factor should be considered.

75,290 views 20 replies
Reply #1 Top

If citizen appearance scaled with empire size in any way, it would just help snowball you to victory that much faster.

Reply #2 Top

No it wouldn't!

Every Civ in the game would enjoy the same scaling factor based on their own statistics.

And of course, I'm not advocating something so artificial and fake as a straight up population scaling factor.  In another thread, I proposed that the scaling be a combination of factors.  Here are some possibilities.

  • Population of each colony
  • Number of colonies
  • Civilization Traits
  • Number and strength of research facilities on each colony
  • How you answered the galactic event dialog regarding education.  Were you willing to pay more to educate your populace?
  • Whether or not you have a hospital on a colony and how populated it is
  • Number and size of colonies with Preparedness Centers and Research Coordination facilities
  • If you employ TEACHERS (an opportunity for a new type of Galactic Citizen, maybe?)
  • Shipyards are the center for spacefaring excellence; wouldn't they have STEM outreach programs?
  • Military Academies and Starports could also have an educational factor
  • Cultural Centers could help create Galactic Citizens

We wouldn't need all of these.  Just pick the most representative 3 or 5 and factor them to make an adjustment number.  Do some mathemagic to keep the number within a range; say from -5 to +5, just to keep the game interesting but not too frustrating.  Add or subtract from 10; round down to the next integer, and you have the number of turns until the next Citizen is "born". 

Repeat every time a new Citizen is granted.

Benefit:  Grow your population and don't let 'em get dumb, and you'll get more Great Citizens.  Raise a bunch of idiots and you'll get fewer.  And maybe have more more disease, Warp Drive explosions, or ships flying into wormholes or blazing hot dwarf stars. 

Simple!

 

Reply #3 Top

Heres why that doesnt work that doesnt explain why big countries arent doing better than the small ones in the real world.

Reply #4 Top

That's right.  But big countries don't HAVE to be doing badly, and small countries don't necessarily have an advantage.  I think factors much bigger would be the quality of the educational systems, government type, level of bureaucracy/corruption, and level of personal freedom of the citizenry.

In GC3, many of these things can be tracked and measured, such as form of government, size, frequency, and quality of research, industry, and financial systems, maybe at different rates (for example, Research more than Financial, Financial more than Shipbuilding Manufacturing, and that more than Social Manufacturing).  Or something easier, such as how many "Coordinated Research" facilities divided by total or average colony population, rather than just number of "Research Laboratories". 

Another game play factor could be whether and how much a government inserts its own bureaucracy into education.  Or how much time, effort, and money might be invested over time.  This can be determined by assessing the answers of a couple of key Galactic Event questions.  The choices could even be really hard, like

"Devote share of Research to STEM and other educational efforts?"

-> Benevolent:  Yes, devote 10% from research (and get/give some other stuff and receive a Galactic Citizen once every 8 or 9 turns instead of every 10 turns)

-> Practical:  Yes, devote 20% from research and 10% each from Financial and Ship Manufacturing (Knowing that these things might slow down but you'll get a Galactic Citizen more often, like maybe once every 5 or 6 turns)

-> Malevolent: No, devote nothing (and get some other stuff)

The above is just an example showing how one input factor could be assessed.  The numbers I chose above may or may not be the best balance for the game.

Reply #5 Top

While I understand your point, from a game balance perspective I have to disagree. Citizens are *powerful*. Here are my issues with it:

1. As mentioned above, the win-more factor. Gaining a citizen at 8 turns or even faster would be potentially game breaking.

2. Providing a bonus or penalty to citizen creation is something that a human player could easily plan for strategically. An AI would have a more difficult time. The AI for a 4x game is already complex. Adding citizen generation as another area for humans to optimize over the AI means the AI is weaker overall.

3. Citizen planet projects. The game already allows you to build specific citizen types on planets and gives you the shipyard Recruiter mission. It's extremely expensive (and should be) but doable. The planet generic citizen project is available too but takes forever. 

 

In my last game, between wonders, recruiting missions, and planets building spies, I ended up with about 50% more citizens than the standard 10/turn. At the end of the game, I felt flooded with them. 

Reply #6 Top

One thing I think people miss is that the social production is now completely separate from ship production.

Once a planet is built out that social production cannot be added to making ships faster.    

you can use it to make more spys, citizens, research, or other but it doesn't do anything for your ships...

Late game I have been able to crank out a citizen using my best world in 9 turns.      so that more than doubles my rate of citizens....      and this is "dear lord the AI is dead now' level powerful...

 

 

 

Reply #7 Top

I always thought citizens should be generated differently for races/traits and ideologies, and why not empire size?  This gives the player some control on how often they receive them and makes for a strategic decision to go down one path or another.  The idea of 10 citizens per turn, regardless of races, empire size, ideology, traits and abilities is completely arbitrary.  It seems to be a lazy design decision, "hmm, 10 turns seems right...just leave it at that."

And I have yet to read anything that says Stardock plans to make any changes to the system, but maybe it's just a system they have in place for now.  

Reply #8 Top

Quoting admiralWillyWilber, reply 3

Heres why that doesnt work that doesnt explain why big countries arent doing better than the small ones in the real world.

 

Really? Which small countries are doing better than China? Than the USA?  In absolute and/or relative terms? Economically, politically, culturally, by every measure that matters those two are dominant. Some smaller countries might be growing their economies faster, or be more efficient, but so what? Relative to body size, an ant runs faster than an elephant, but - "in the real world" - who wins a race between them? Size matters. Why do those two countries have the lions share of the world's billionaires between them? 

 

Bigger empires should get more citizens, but also get bogged down by admin and bureaucracy and loss of efficiency - so they need the citizens to help compensate. Bigger empires should have their trade values scale more appropriately as well.

Reply #9 Top

Quoting Space, reply 8


Quoting admiralWillyWilber,

Heres why that doesnt work that doesnt explain why big countries arent doing better than the small ones in the real world.



 

Really? Which small countries are doing better than China? Than the USA?  In absolute and/or relative terms? Economically, politically, culturally, by every measure that matters those two are dominant. Some smaller countries might be growing their economies faster, or be more efficient, but so what? Relative to body size, an ant runs faster than an elephant, but - "in the real world" - who wins a race between them? Size matters. Why do those two countries have the lions share of the world's billionaires between them? 

 

Bigger empires should get more citizens, but also get bogged down by admin and bureaucracy and loss of efficiency - so they need the citizens to help compensate. Bigger empires should have their trade values scale more appropriately as well.

The history of world shows that population is not a huge factor in leadership.

Reply #10 Top

Quoting Frogboy, reply 9

The history of world shows that population is not a huge factor in leadership.

Disagree. That map reflects historical dominance of those nations  (UK, France Spain, Portugal Netherlands et al) when they did have larger populations (and technological, cultural and political advantages) compared to the nations they colonised and conquered.  And how much that dominance, though faded, is still worth today. They looted and plundered, (you could say exploited and exterminated after exploring and expanding...) and they did it good.

 

I presume the nations in red indicates a negative value - USA, Luxembourg, UK? 

Reply #11 Top

Population Growth should indeed be a factor.  This can be used to factor the number of school-aged of the population.  Sure, for some people the learning never stops, and there's always the great story of the 95 year old great grandmother who just finished her doctorate in anthropology or microneural surgery, but that's rare enough that it wouldn't need to be represented in this game.

Think about this for a moment: 

If I am driving a very entrepreneurial manufacturing, research, and STEM-oriented society, with a lot of young people in school and successfully completing school, then how can that NOT be a positive factor in the development of new Galactic Citizens? 

If my premise is on target, then how would you measure "young people in school"?  That may not be as difficult as you might think.  Pull the growth rate from the planet's stats.  If the growth rate is fast, that means there are more young people in that colony's population.  As the growth rate plateaus, then there is either an equilibrium of new citizens vs dying citizens, and that can be applied.  If the growth rate falls, whether it's due to the destruction of a city or farms, or due to some other factor (recent battles, large number of transports or colony ships leaving lately), then that can be applied too.

Once again though; population or population growth rate shouldn't be used by itself.  Research, Manufacturing, and financial health probably should be stronger factors, along with the answers you give during various Galactic Events.

And I would think that the rate of Galactic Citizens should be a factor of both individual colonies AND the sum of all the colonies.

Or...and this would complicate the calculations, make each Colony capable of contributing its own "Galactic Citizen points" to the total needed to generate a new one.  More entrepreneurial colonies would contribute more points.  Crapholes would contribute fewer points, but all colonies would be able to contribute something, just as all cities/countries contribute here on Earth.  I do understand that we wouldn't want the game to become unplayably complicated, but let's face it, great people do come from all walks of life and all levels of society; just less in some and more in others.

Reply #12 Top

Quoting Space, reply 10


Quoting Frogboy,

The history of world shows that population is not a huge factor in leadership.



Disagree. That map reflects historical dominance of those nations  (UK, France Spain, Portugal Netherlands et al) when they did have larger populations (and technological, cultural and political advantages) compared to the nations they colonised and conquered.  And how much that dominance, though faded, is still worth today. They looted and plundered, (you could say exploited and exterminated after exploring and expanding...) and they did it good.

 

I presume the nations in red indicates a negative value - USA, Luxembourg, UK? 

I confess that I do not exactly understand the significance of the map. Germany, for instance, is the largest of the blue States but it was a minor participant in the colonial period. How in the heck does Iceland play into anything? I am sure the map makes an interesting point but I just don't see the point.

If the red does represent deficit, is UK actually in more debt that the US?

I agree that growth and population should be a factor in gaining game citizens.

Reply #13 Top

Every empire, regardless of size, gets one FREE citizen every 10 turns.  That is without any effort on the player part.

As mentioned above, several times, any empire may create citizens, at a cost.  That cost is (generally) social manufacturing.  By doing so, you can have more than 1 citizen every 10 turns.

Assume that the citizen creation project is your beloved STEM, and boom, you are back in the game.

Reply #14 Top

Quoting Space, reply 8


Quoting admiralWillyWilber,

Heres why that doesnt work that doesnt explain why big countries arent doing better than the small ones in the real world.



 

Really? Which small countries are doing better than China? Than the USA?  In absolute and/or relative terms? Economically, politically, culturally, by every measure that matters those two are dominant. Some smaller countries might be growing their economies faster, or be more efficient, but so what? Relative to body size, an ant runs faster than an elephant, but - "in the real world" - who wins a race between them? Size matters. Why do those two countries have the lions share of the world's billionaires between them? 

 

Bigger empires should get more citizens, but also get bogged down by admin and bureaucracy and loss of efficiency - so they need the citizens to help compensate. Bigger empires should have their trade values scale more appropriately as well.

china is only doing better industrially not financially or scientifically. I have on other post brought up the list. Financially singapoor and five other countries are doing better. The us is losing in manufacturing and scientifically. China has the most population, but is not the biggest while russia is the biggest. I also noticed that you brought up two wide countries out of 200 countries.

Reply #15 Top

Quoting GrimmAG, reply 13

Every empire, regardless of size, gets one FREE citizen every 10 turns.  That is without any effort on the player part.

As mentioned above, several times, any empire may create citizens, at a cost.  That cost is (generally) social manufacturing.  By doing so, you can have more than 1 citizen every 10 turns.

Assume that the citizen creation project is your beloved STEM, and boom, you are back in the game.

Hmmmm, your use of the phrase "without any effort on the player" made me realize that the current methodology is much like a "societal entitlement" mechanism.  The equivalent of the "participation trophy", so to speak.  I am proposing that we move to an "earned" system.  "Great Citizens" don't "just happen".  Instead, they happen on purpose, when a young person has teachers, parents, or benefactors in place to help and encourage learning, a strong work ethic, and overall excellence.  Of course, the future Great Citizen must have and execute on the drive to take advantage of these opportunities that those aforementioned role models offer.

The "Citizen Creation Project" could certainly serve in the game as one of those benefactors, but it's really only a one-off opportunity, which in a game that can have 500 or 5000 turns, is nearly useless in the length of a game and only useful in getting a temporary advantage. 

My proposal improves on the current model because it better rewards the player who employs an ongoing entrepreneurial strategy; which is much closer to how it works in real life with STEM education (even before the acronym was first coined).

Reply #16 Top

Quoting BIF, reply 15


Quoting GrimmAG,

Every empire, regardless of size, gets one FREE citizen every 10 turns.  That is without any effort on the player part.

As mentioned above, several times, any empire may create citizens, at a cost.  That cost is (generally) social manufacturing.  By doing so, you can have more than 1 citizen every 10 turns.

Assume that the citizen creation project is your beloved STEM, and boom, you are back in the game.



Hmmmm, your use of the phrase "without any effort on the player" made me realize that the current methodology is much like a "societal entitlement" mechanism.  The equivalent of the "participation trophy", so to speak.  I am proposing that we move to an "earned" system.  "Great Citizens" don't "just happen".  Instead, they happen on purpose, when a young person has teachers, parents, or benefactors in place to help and encourage learning, a strong work ethic, and overall excellence.  Of course, the future Great Citizen must have and execute on the drive to take advantage of these opportunities that those aforementioned role models offer.

The "Citizen Creation Project" could certainly serve in the game as one of those benefactors, but it's really only a one-off opportunity, which in a game that can have 500 or 5000 turns, is nearly useless in the length of a game and only useful in getting a temporary advantage. 

My proposal improves on the current model because it better rewards the player who employs an ongoing entrepreneurial strategy; which is much closer to how it works in real life with STEM education (even before the acronym was first coined).

 

This is entirely based on what you believe leads to a Great Citizen...

 

How would you account for Great Citizens that are not based on the power of Military Academies, STEM, entrepreneurial strategy, Manufacturing, and Financial health?

 

Education, a happy childhood, positive ideology and the wealth of the birth county are not necessarily a true measure of the path to greatness.

 

Mother Teresa was born Anjezë Gonxhe (or Gonxha)[7] Bojaxhiu (Albanian: [aˈɲɛzə ˈɡɔndʒɛ bɔjaˈdʒiu]; Anjezë is a cognate of "Agnes"; Gonxhe means "rosebud" or "little flower" in Albanian) on 26 August 1910 into a Kosovar Albanian family[8][9][10] in Skopje (now the capital of the Republic of Macedonia), Ottoman Empire.[11][12] She was baptized in Skopje, the day after her birth.[7] She later considered 27 August, the day she was baptised, her "true birthday".[11]

 

She was the youngest child of Nikollë and Dranafile Bojaxhiu (Bernai).[13] Her father, who was involved in Albanian-community politics in Macedonia, died in 1919 when she was eight years old.[11][14] He may have been from Prizren, Kosovo, and her mother may have been from a village near Gjakova.[15]

 

According to a biography by Joan Graff Clucas, during her early years Teresa was fascinated by stories of the lives of missionaries and their service in Bengal; by age 12, she was convinced that she should commit herself to religious life.[16] Her resolve strengthened on 15 August 1928 as she prayed at the shrine of the Black Madonna of Vitina-Letnice, where she often went on pilgrimages.[17]

 

Teresa left home in 1928 at age 18 to join the Sisters of Loreto at Loreto Abbey in Rathfarnham, Ireland, to learn English with the view of becoming a missionary; English was the language of instruction of the Sisters of Loreto in India.[18] She never saw her mother or her sister again.[19] Her family lived in Skopje until 1934, when they moved to Tirana.[20]

 

She arrived in India in 1929[21] and began her novitiate in Darjeeling, in the lower Himalayas,[22] where she learnt Bengali and taught at St. Teresa's School near her convent.[23] Teresa took her first religious vows on 24 May 1931. She chose to be named after Thérèse de Lisieux, the patron saint of missionaries;[24][25] because a nun in the convent had already chosen that name, Agnes opted for its Spanish spelling (Teresa).[26]

 

Teresa took her solemn vows on 14 May 1937 while she was a teacher at the Loreto convent school in Entally, eastern Calcutta.[11][27][28] She served there for nearly twenty years, and was appointed its headmistress in 1944.[29] Although Teresa enjoyed teaching at the school, she was increasingly disturbed by the poverty surrounding her in Calcutta.[30] The Bengal famine of 1943 brought misery and death to the city, and the August 1946 Direct Action Day began a period of Muslim-Hindu violence.[31]

 

 

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi[14] was born on 2 October 1869[1] to a Hindu Modh Baniya family[15] in Porbandar (also known as Sudamapuri), a coastal town on the Kathiawar Peninsula and then part of the small princely state of Porbandar in the Kathiawar Agency of the Indian Empire. His father, Karamchand Uttamchand Gandhi (1822–1885), served as the diwan (chief minister) of Porbandar state.[16]

Although he only had an elementary education and had previously been a clerk in the state administration, Karamchand proved a capable chief minister

 

Rudyard Kipling's days of "strong light and darkness" in Bombay ended when he was five years old.[25] As was the custom in British India, he and his three-year-old sister Alice ("Trix") were taken to the United Kingdom —in their case to Southsea, Portsmouth—to live with a couple who boarded children of British nationals who were serving in India.[26] For the next six years from October 1871 to April 1877, the two children lived with the couple, Captain Pryse Agar Holloway, once an officer in the merchant navy, and Mrs Sarah Holloway, at their house, Lorne Lodge at 4 Campbell Road, Southsea.[27]

In his autobiography, published some 65 years later, Kipling recalled the stay with horror, and wondered ironically if the combination of cruelty and neglect which he experienced there at the hands of Mrs. Holloway might not have hastened the onset of his literary life: "If you cross-examine a child of seven or eight on his day’s doings (specially when he wants to go to sleep) he will contradict himself very satisfactorily. If each contradiction be set down as a lie and retailed at breakfast, life is not easy. I have known a certain amount of bullying, but this was calculated torture—religious as well as scientific. Yet it made me give attention to the lies I soon found it necessary to tell: and this, I presume, is the foundation of literary effort".[25]

 

Abraham Lincoln was more or less entirely self-educated, though at an early age he actually had a reputation of being lazy. This did not stop him from starting down a career in politics in his early twenties, and being admitted to the bar after teaching himself the law in his free time.

 

Mark Twain left school after the fifth grade[17] to become a printer's apprentice.

 

My proposal improves on the current model because it better rewards the player who employs an ongoing entrepreneurial strategy; which is much closer to how it works in real life with STEM education (even before the acronym was first coined).

 

What is real life and the clear rules that define greatness???

 

Reply #17 Top

I'm happy to acknowledge that you are describing another factor in the creation of a Great Citizen:  Self Drive.

That's very good, but all you provided was a few specially-chosen examples of only one way of thinking.  You may have rushed to a conclusion here.  You see, Self Drive by its lonesome neither detracts from nor makes useless the factors I brought up, which have to do with the developmental environment for a person growing up. 

I acknowledge your thinking, but it doesn't preclude mine.  I don't mind the 1:10 ratio.  Well, IL don't mind it as a starting point, that is. 

I just think there's room for a MODIFIER.  So far, the folks against this idea just seem to be against ANY idea that a person's environmental surroundings (during their development) could have a positive impact on their outcome IN ADDITION TO their Self Drive.

Sure, Self Drive is a major factor.  But some of the greatest people alive will credit a parent, teacher, or other respected person for giving them the chance to succeed.  Others will credit their time spent in a certain school, or their tutelage in a unique learning environment that's not a school. 

Yes, even kings and queens have positively impacted the life of a Great Person.  How many composers, sculptors, and painters wouldn't even be known today if they hadn't gotten their commission from a person of nobility?

GalCiv3 can accommodate this, and really, it's merely a math problem.  Just about EVERY colony tile improvement could serve as a unique learning environment, and therefore could be mathematically factored into the modifier that I'm proposing.  People learn in factories, and take that knowledge home for that weekend project helping their kids build a Pinewood Derby car, or better yet, a real go-cart.  Other people will develop their science skills in their research jobs, and might help THEIR kids with a science project.  Come on, didn't YOUR mom help you make that volcano or solar system model for the school science fair?  Finance folks will surely learn MORE about finances in a financial capital than they ever would in a school.  Some will take that knowledge home and impart it to their children.  Some children with diplomatic parents will have their own unique experiences.

I acknowledge that sometimes environmental factors can't be calculated simply (or at all), and that's why I say the 1:10 ratio is a good starting point.  My parents had no real background in music, art, math, or computers, yet here I am crediting them for all they did to encourage my siblings and I to be more than we were.  To be more than THEY were.  Or to at least try.  And we're all successful today.  There's NO WAY I'm going to sit here with my hubris and try to claim that it was all from my own Self Drive.  No, that would be giving myself way too much credit and other people not nearly enough. 

I am, at least in part, a product of my environment, yesterday and today.  And so are you.

Not to compare franchises, but the Civilization games DO split out Great People points, based on what has been built in the player's civilization, as well as the governance being employed, and whether or not wars are being fought on land or on sea.  If you do these things, you'll earn Great Generals faster.  If you do those things, you'll earn Great Engineers faster.  And so on.  I'm not proposing that GalCiv3 be made to work exactly like Civilization (I like being able to choose the training for my GP), but I am suggesting that we allow for greatness that comes in part from the environment present (or absent) during a person's developmental years.

Again, 1:10 is fine for a starting point.  With environmental factors (and traits too, why not?) applied as a modifier.

Reply #18 Top

The issue here was never that people arent influenced by their environment, but at least in this society the size, or population of the country doesnt usually seem to influence things. Even if you could site one country it would only less than a half percent. Your idea of what you do would influence the type of citizen sounds good except people wouldnt be able to choose them. Maybe instead groups of certain citizens. If maybe we worked your idea as percents not numbers, and great people rising above citizens.if the game had more mechanics you might have a point. My belief, or at least japan which wasnt on the list at least did that probably by trade. 

Reply #19 Top

Ultimately this comes down to our classic debate: Gameplay vs Realism.

If you look at history, when it comes to the empire game, bigger is better. That's just the way it is.

 

Now most modern 4x games have built in mechanics to prevent big empires from running away withe the game....to a point. Bigger eventually will win out militarily, but mechanics often weaken that multiplier.

Crusade's citizen system serves two purposes: Its both a cool and fun way to get bonuses, but it also is provided equally to small and big empires a like. Now again ultimately big empires can make greater use of them in the long run (ie leaders over large empires)...but its takes some time to get there, and allows smaller empires to be competitive longer.

Is it "realistic"....no. Is it as realistic as most of the things I swallow to enjoy a game that features space travel with a variety of aliens that all just happen to start space travel at the exact same time over the billions of years the universe has been around....yep, its good enough for me:)

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Reply #20 Top

Agreed.

Nice post... downright sensible.